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Salmon Pappardelle with Lemon Cream Sauce

Sometimes I make a dish that makes me want to hug myself in gratitude. This is one such dish. I have always loved the combination of salmon with pasta in cream sauce, it is my one exception where I will eat salmon warm because otherwise I must have my salmon cold. I have actually been dreaming about making this for probably a couple of years (I dream so big, don't I?) but I never have salmon around so I never get to make it. Well, this week I had some leftover baked salmon (by leftover I mean that I squirreled some away from the table to make sure I had enough to make my dream a reality) and I was ready to cook. I knew I was going to make a cream sauce but last minute I had a stroke of genius where I decided that a lemon cream sauce would go so well considering how well lemon goes with fish and how much I'm obsessed with lemons (we still haven't discussed that yet but I don't want to scare anyone.) The combination was DIVINE- just enough lemon flavor that it truly enhanced the salmon and gave the pasta sauce that little something extra. I threw blanched broccoli in for some color, crunch and vegetable factor not really thinking it would add that much but it really did. All together it was just such a great combination and a fantastically good meal. I highly reccomend using a thick pasta like a fettuccine, tagliatelle or papperdelle with this because the thickness holds up really well to the cream sauce but in a pinch you can use spaghetti. Enjoy!

Season the salmon with salt and pepper and roast in the oven at 350 for about 12 minutes or until done. Remove and cool. Once the salmon is cool, cut into cubes. Bring a pot of salted water to a boil and blanch the broccoli for just 2 minutes, strain leaving the water in the pot and run the broccoli under cold water to stop the cooking. Cook the pasta in the water from the broccoli until just al-dente. Meanwhile in a small sauce pan, melt the butter and add the cream and lemon zest. Let the cream simmer for 5 minutes while whisking it until it thickens. Remove from heat and add the lemon juice, parmesan, nutmeg, red pepper flakes and salt and pepper. Mix the sauce with the pasta and toss in the salmon and broccoli. Serve with another squeeze of lemon juiced over it.